How Will the Fiscal Cliff Affect You?

Like the vast majority of people living in the United States, after reading the handy WSJ infographic I have absolutely no idea. To borrow a line from Lindsay Beyerstein, I do especially like the fact that the single mother valiantly trying to scrape by on a measly $180 $260 grand a year is portrayed like someone in a dust bowl photograph commissioned by the Farm Security Administration.

No, that poor, poor single mother is trying to scrape by on $260k/yr. It’s that retired black couple who’s destitute on $180k/yr, and still looking miserable even though their taxes aren’t going up at all.

Brandon

Wait, where is that retired couple getting the other $100k+ of their income if investment income is only $52k? Some kick-ass pensions that the WSJ would typically argue should be eliminated?

Mudge

They could get maybe $50k a year from Social Security and the rest from two pensions of $35,000 or so each. The lack of any tax increase is strange, however.

catclub

I think there is an absolute maximum amount paid by SS,
and apparently it is $2315/month = $30156/yr.

Ah, one each and it gets to $60k for the two of them.

JKTHs

They have one of those rare mythical defined benefit pensions I’ve been hearing about?

JoyfulA

I have one of those. It pays me $110.00 a month.

(To be fair, I worked there only 13 years, including part-time in college, and was barely vested, and I chose survivor benefits for my younger spouse instead of $142.00 per month.)

Vance Maverick

younger spouse

Bigamy is expensive!

Tracy Lightcap

And what a coinkidink! The one couple who don’t see their taxes going up is – wait for it – black!

Isn’t that special?

Jon H

“and still looking miserable even though their taxes aren’t going up at all.”

And of course it’s the black folks who are the lucky duckies with no tax increase (honorary 47%ers?), and making the lowest income of all the examples.

JKTHs

They must assume that people below $180K either are illiterate, don’t have computer access at all, can’t afford or figure out how to get the paywall, and somehow don’t pay the payroll tax.

NonyNony

Clearly the WSJ knows their own audience.

Snarki, child of Loki

Yeah, well the ConserviTards *have* been saying that $250K/year doesn’t make you “rich”.

Except if you’re something like a schoolteacher or city bus driver, in which case $30K is living in the lap of luxury.

JKTHs

And if you’re unemployed, even better.

Steve LaBonne

Lucky duckies!

Malaclypse

Funemployment!

Dirty Davey

And of course, the black people don’t have any tax increase at all.

RedSquareBear

Well duh. They didn’t raise taxes on t-bone steaks and Cadillacs!

somethingblue

Certainly not. In fact, jackbooted representatives of the U.S. government will shortly be arriving at your house to confiscate and sell your children’s stuffed animals in order to give the black people a rebate on taxes they never paid in the first place because Benghazi.

Mudge

Some math. The poor single mother earns $260,000 a year and pays roughly $80,000 in taxes (Federal I assume). Net $180,000. She pays roughly $3500 more in tax. $1500 is from raising the investment tax to 20% from 15% (5% of $35000, oh the pain) and $2000 of that is from THE NONRENEWAL OF THE PAYROLL TAX HOLIDAY (2% of roughly $100,000, thank you Republicans).

It’s all Obama’s fault

Cody

It’s important to note she’s a job creator according to Republicans, so now we’ll have that many less jobs!

Joshua

What I would be interested in knowing is how that woman become single. Normally, being a single mother is VERY BAD for future income, but this woman is doing just fine (maybe not by WSJ standards, but by reality). Either she is an insanely-driven and ambitious person, in which case, good for her, she is reaping the rewards with that fat income.

Or… she married well and got a nice big divorce settlement, in which case she’s also getting some decent child support too. In that case, good for her, she’s doing just fine.

cpinva

those aren’t her kids, wsj rented them for the article. i want to be adopted by the married couple. a small room in the basement will be fine, as long as it has cable tv/internet service.

In a surprise twist, the GOP has decided that they’re fans of Murphy Brown’s life choices after all.

chris y

OK, let me guess. This graphic was put together by some really deep entry Trotskyist mole who’s been quietly burrowing away on the WSJ for the last 30 years, waiting for the perfect moment to issue a provocation that’ll make the masses pouring out of theaters showing Les Mis march straight to the Journal offices and storm them like the Bastille.

Julian

The preferred nomenclature is Trotskyite

I’m 0-1 on correcting people today, help me out here

RedSquareBear

Nope. Trotskyist is the self-applied label, Trotskyite is a pejorative diminutive applied by Stalin et. al.

(That al is such an asshole…)

Julian

0-2

I’ve never seen trotskyist anywhere, probably not well-read enough.

RedSquareBear

Sorry bro. I can make some mistakes if you’d like:

1. I am a Historian
2. The Democrat party stands for Socialism
3. If you write me that ticket I’ll call the Attorney Generals for our respective states (which are totally allowed to succeed from the union).

Malaclypse

4 Obama’s proposed changes to gun laws proves he is about to declare Marshall Law.

cpinva

many years ago, when i was commuting by bus up to my office in DC, the bus went down 14th street on the way home. back then, 14th street was well known for its topless bars and porn stores. one day, while stopped at a red light, i happened to glance at a sign, in one porn store’s window. among other items for sale, were “martial aids”.

“4 Obama’s proposed changes to gun laws proves he is about to declare Marshall Law.”

to this day, i have no idea what those might have been, and it’s probably best that i remain ignorant.

rm

If your name is Marshall, you are in good shape. Note to self: suck up to Marshall at the office more.

Sweetums

“martial aids”

Jason Ogg might be able to explain those to you.

JustRuss

While he’s at it, could he declare Marshall Plan for the 99% of us who aren’t WSJ readers?

Where is this from? I’m particularly interested in the use of the “kill your parents” meme regarding Ron Paul.

(the other) Davis

One of my Facebook friends pointed out some further absurdity in those numbers:

For the single mom, I’d like them to footnote how much principal she invested to throw off that kind of investment income, then explain how in the world it was accumulated on that salary in those circumstances.

My hypothesis is that she had the good sense and foresight to inherit it.

Incontinentia Buttocks

Don’t discount a lucrative divorce settlement (bet he regrets not insisting on that pre nup, amirite?).

GFW

The Massey prenup has never been penetrated.

JKTHs

Oh, I assumed that she had managed to put her surplus pennies per month into stocks that generated +1000000000000% returns.

Malaclypse

Perhaps she chose the same mix of funds as Mitt Romney’s IRA?

Brandon C.

+1

Alex

You may laugh, but the sellers of Pink Himalayan salt and $1800 kitchen gadgets curse your name, your family, and the ground upon which you walk.

RedSquareBear

Fresh Market (the Whole Foods clone in my area) sells pink salt in a grinder-thing. It’s like a buck more than the other salt grinder-thing. I don’t get what you’re trying to say.

It’s legitimately pretty good salt, I’d recommend it.

NonyNony

He’s making fun of Megan McArdle.

RedSquareBear

Ah.

The nomenclature of obscure early-20th century left wing sectarian disputes: pretty good at.

Well known (if questionably credentialed) libertarian business columnists in (fairly) major and (Scientology notwithstanding) legitimate print and online journals: not so good at.

Anon21

in (fairly) major and (Scientology notwithstanding) legitimate print and online journals

Nah, she’s at the Daily Beast now.

Which I suppose only proves your point. Curses!

Jon H

And if you buy it as a salt lick for horses it’s about 1/3 the price of the stuff in gourmet drag.

Now that you can get it at Costco, McArdle will likely move on from cheap, commonplace stuff like pink himalayan salt to $300 vials of salt formed from the tears of parents of her human wave toddler fodder suicide squads, trained to rush assault rifle-wielding gunmen.

elm

Fresh Market? You a Tallahassee resident or are there more than one of them?

RedSquareBear

They expanded a couple stores into the (relatively speaking) tony bits of Milwaukee one of which my (rather less tony) suburb happens to border.

They’re pretty good. Good cheese and beer sections. The deli is nothing special though.

Pestilence

There’s one in one of the leafier bits of Little Rock, for that matter.

Scott Lemieux

They have one here in sunny Albany. Pretty nice, actually, cheaper than Whole Foods.

A friend of mine noted on Facebook that the picture of the single woman with her two kids who earns $260,000 looks like it was drawn to be evocative of Lange’s Migrant Mother. Truly, the irony, it is dead.

UserGoogol

Eh, I really don’t see it. There’s only so many ways you can depict an unhappy woman with two children in a relatively small space. And even then, the particular poses are quite different. And simply the mom-with-two-kids setup seems fairly generic.